Thinner You, Healthier Planet

Alicia Silverstone is the poster child for living a thin, green life. This veganista walks the walk and has a smaller carbon footprint than most of us. She is an example of an article I read recently in Health Magazine. The thinner we are, the less impact we have on our environment.

A study conducted by The London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine found that the heavier we are, the more greenhouse gases we produce. The study also assumes that heavier people are likely to drive more often and eat more. Doing both requires more energy to move the cars around and produce additional food.

Here are some quick tips for a healthier you and a greener planet:

Meatless Mondays. Join this group of people who are committing to eat one vegetarian meal per week. If everyone in the US ate one vegetarian meal per week we’d save 70 million gallons of gas per year.

Eat Less Food. Michael Pollan has eloquently demonstrated that we don’t need to eat as much food as we currently consume and that the world will be a better place for it. Here are 10 of my favorite Food Rules.

Walk more. Walking keeps us limber, keeps our heart healthy and happy, and keeps our waistlines slim. The more errands you can accomplish walking, the less gas we’re using and the longer your car will last too. It’s a win/win for everyone. If you have to drive a car, try to lump all your errands into one trip and drive as few miles as possible.

How do you stay skinny and green? I’d love to hear your stories.

Be Well,

Lisa

About Lisa Johnson

Lisa Johnson here. I've been a personal trainer since 1997, a Pilates instructor since 1998 and the owner of Modern Pilates since 1999. I'm hoping to give you some good ideas to get or stay in shape with a healthy dose of humor and reality. Thanks for joining me.

6 Responses to Thinner You, Healthier Planet

how in the heck is ”to eat one vegetarian meal per week. If everyone in the US ate one vegetarian meal per week we’d save 70 million gallons of gas per year.”theres no way it can save the person or gas, as the vegetables cost more,they still have to be transported just like the meat to the store, i mean the only way this could be possible,is if all the truckers took a day off,hauled no food for one day a week,and everyone had there own garden, that was given to them, so no cost,as then they would pick there own veggies from there garden with out driving to town… i like to know how u figured this one out,huh…

While eating one meatless meal per week might not saves gas properly, as vegetables still needs to be transported, there are many green benefits to eating vegetarian:

-Growing vegetables takes much less water than cattle breeding
-Cattle needs to be fed, and the crops used to feed animals are often the most polluting
-Animals contributes to global warming (because of the methane formation)
-The space used/food produced ratio is by far better by growing plant based food than for cattle breeding

And at last, at least here in eastern Canada, meat meals cost more than vegeterian ones (beans and legumes cost much less than a steak!)

@Brad I think the theory is that in order to feed the animals that we eat, we give them veggies. So the veggies will have to be grown, delivered, and fed to animals that are going to produce a lot of waste and greenhouse gas. Then the animals have to be “processed” and then shipped to stores for us to buy and consume. So you eliminate one step in the process by just eating the veggies directly instead of eating the animals that ate the veggies. You have to assume there will be less energy used to cook the veggies, most of which can be eaten raw, than meat that has to be cooked thoroughly to be safe for consumption.

If people were eating vegetarian they would probably be fixing the meal at home as opposed to driving to McDonald’s or other establishments that don’t offer many vegetarian options, another gas saver. And, as an additional smaller bonus, if more people were vegetarian, there would be less people driving to the doctor for high cholesterol prescriptions, or to the pharmacies for refills.